Automatic renting apparatus

ABSTRACT

An automatic renting apparatus is for automatically renting rental articles and restoring returned rental articles. The automatic renting apparatus stores information concerning rental articles that have been rented out, rental articles to supplement or replace the stock, and the scheduled date of replacement or supplement. When the patron subscribes in advance for a rental article, information is displayed on a display unit to enable the patron to select a desired rental article for which the patron desires to make advance subscription. Upon the selection of the desired rental article and a desired renting date by the patron, information concerning the desired rental article and the desired renting date is stored in a subscription information storage unit.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present invention relates to an automatic renting apparatus forautomatically renting rental articles.

2. Description of the Prior Art

Rental systems have diffused nowadays and many desired industrialcommodities are available for rent. Rental articles are rented forremuneration equivalent to the value and rental term of the same and arereturned upon the expiration of the rental term.

Rental articles include records, clothes and automobiles. Theprogressive diffusion of video tape recorders for domestic uses inrecent years has caused a remarkable expansion in the demand for movievideo tapes. Generally, the rental business for renting rental articlesto renters requires personal services in renting rental articles.However, automatic renting apparatus capable of providing automaticrenting services have diffused in the rental business in recent years tocarry out renting work quickly and to expand the rental business market.U.S. Pat. No. 4,458,802 to Maciver et.al. discloses such an automaticrenting apparatus, which automatically performs procedures for rentingarticles and storing rental articles returned from renters on the basisof information recorded in cards previously issued to registeredpatrons. However, patrons are unable to rent articles presently rentedout. Furthermore, the rental articles stored in such an automaticrenting apparatus include those which are not rented frequently andthose which have been worn by frequent use by renters. Accordingly, someof the stock of rental articles are replaced periodically with new onesor changed for other rental articles to improve the operating efficiencyof the rental articles and to improve services to patrons. However, thepatrons are unable to know previously new rental articles added to thestock for periodic replacement of the rental articles. Accordingly,patrons have been unable to subscribe in advance for rental articlesbefore the replacement of the rental articles.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide anautomatic renting apparatus capable of accepting advance subscriptionfor rental articles presently rented out.

It is another object of the present invention to provide an automaticrenting apparatus capable of accepting advance subscription for rentalarticles which have not yet been kept in stock, namely, rental articleswhich will shortly be added to the stock.

The above and other objects, features and advantages of the presentinvention will become more apparent from the following description takenin conjunction with the accompanying drawings.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a flow chart showing the operation steps of an automaticrenting apparatus, in a preferred embodiment, according to the presentinvention, in response to an advance subscription for a commodity;

FIG. 2 is an illustration of the information format of a card issued toa registered patron;

FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing the functional components of anautomatic renting apparatus embodying the present invention;

FIG. 4 is an illustration of a format of records stored in the rentalinformation storage unit of the automatic renting apparatus of FIG. 3;

FIG. 5 is an illustration of a format of records stored in thesubscription information storage unit of the automatic renting apparatusof FIG. 3; and

FIG. 6 is a perspective view showing the external appearance of theautomatic renting apparatus of FIG. 3.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT

A card issued to a registered patron (hereinafter referred to as "amembership card") for use on an automatic renting apparatus of thepresent invention is a magnetic card or an IC (integrated circuit) cardin which information can magnetically or electrically be written anderased. The information written in the membership card includes (1) ashop number representing the shop from which the a membership card wasissued, (2) membership number, (3) attributes of the member such as thedate of birth and age of the member, (4) the name of the member, (5) theterm of the validity of the membership card, (6) an apparatus number,(7) a rental article number including information for advancesubscription, (8) a rental term, (9) the frequency of delayed return,(10) the number of rented articles and (11) the number of misreturn.These items of the information are written individually.

Referring to FIG. 3 showing the principal components of an automaticrenting apparatus embodying the present invention, there are shown amain control unit 1, a readonly memory (hereinafter abbreviated to"ROM") 2 for storing control programs, a random access memory(hereinafter abbreviated to "RAM") 3 for temporarily storing input data,a calendar 4 for providing the actual date and hour, a battery-backed-up5 RAM for securing necessary data in case the automatic rentingapparatus is disconnected accidentally from a power supply, a flexibledisk drive (hereinafter abbreviated to "FDD") 6 for storing informationconcerning the stock position and stock condition of articles stored inthe storage shelves and information concerning patrons, storage shelves7 for storing rental articles such as video tape cassettes, an articletransfer mechanism 8 for transferring the rental articles between thestorage shelves and an article dispensing and returning opening, anarticle control unit 9 for controlling the storage shelves 7 and thearticle transfer mechanism 8, a cash handling mechanism 10 for countingcash deposited by patrons, storing the cash and paying change, a printmechanism 11 for printing the contents of a transaction on a receiptwhen renting and recovering rental articles, an operation guidancedisplay 12 for displaying guidance instructions to the patrons foroperating the automatic renting apparatus when renting and returningrental articles, an input unit 13 which is operated by patrons to giveinformation to the automatic renting apparatus when renting andreturning rental articles, a display unit (hereinafter referred to as"CRT") 14 concerning the displaying instructions for operation andinformation about rental articles in messages and patterns for guidance,a card read/write unit (hereinafter referred to as "card R/W unit") 15for reading information from and writing information in a card, and avoice generating mechanism 16 which generates speeches corresponding tothe messages displayed on the CRT 14.

Information entered by operating the input unit 13 and data read by thecard R/W unit 15 are stored temporarily in the RAM 3. The calendar 4 isalso backed up by the backup battery of the battery-backed-up RAM 5. Arental information storage unit 6a and an advance subscriptioninformation storage unit 6b, which will be described later withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5, are included in either the FDD 6 or thebattery-backed-up RAM 5, or in both the FDD 6 and the battery-backed-upRAM 5. In this embodiment, the rental information storage unit 6a andthe advance subscription information storage unit 6b are included in theFDD 6. The FDD 6 includes a replacement schedule storage unit 6c forstoring information such as data concerning the articles forsupplementing the stock in the near future and the date of replacementin a recording medium. The article transfer mechanism 8 is provided witha read unit 8a for reading identification codes, such as bar codes,attached to rental articles.

FIG. 4 is a rental information format in the rental information storageunit 6a of the FDD 6. The rental information storage unit 6a has aplurality of areas for storing the article number, the renting date andmembership information about the members. Article numbers of articlesrented to renters, date of renting articles to renters and membershipnumbers of renters are written respectively in the areas for articlenumber, for renting date and for membership information to specifyrenters, articles and renting date.

FIG. 5 is an information format in the advance subscription informationstorage unit 6b. The advance subscription information storage unit 6bhas a plurality of areas for storing article numbers, renting dateinformation and membership information. Article numbers, renting dateinformation and membership information are written in those areas tospecify the date on which the article is to be rented and the patron whohas subscribed in advance for the article.

As shown, in FIG. 6, the automatic renting apparatus has a housing 17for housing the components of the automatic renting apparatus, and apatron operation section is defined by a front panel 30a, an operatingpanel 30b and a side panel 30c in the upper section of the housing 17.An article information board 18 indicating the name and article numbersof articles which are frequently rented is provided on the front panel30a. Provided on the side panel 30c are an article dispensing andreturning opening 19 for dispensing a rental article therethrough andreceiving a rental article returned by a renter, a bank note inlet 20for receiving bank notes deposited by a renter, a coin inlet 21 forreceiving coins deposited by a renter, a coin refund button 22 which isoperated by a patron to request the refund of coins, a card inlet 23 forinserting the membership card in the card R/W unit 15, an operationguidance display 12 having pilot lamps 12a, 12b and 12c, and anindicator 24 which indicates whether the automatic renting apparatus isoperative or whether the same is inoperative.

An article dispensing opening and an article returning opening may beprovided separately instead of the single article dispensing andreturning opening 19.

Provided on the operating panel 30b of the patron operation section area receipt dispensing opening 26 for dispensing a receipt printed by theprint mechanism 11, the CRT 14, function keys (hereinafter referred toas "F keys") 13a of the input unit 13, and information input keysincluding numeric keys 13b, a confirmation key 3c and a cancellation key13d.

A coin dispensing opening 25 is formed in the housing 17 to dispensechange.

The operation of the automatic renting apparatus will be describedhereinafter with reference to FIGS. 1 through 6.

Although the respective operations of the component units are controlledby the main control unit 1 according to control programs stored in theROM 2, the description of the control program read operation of the maincontrol unit 1 will be omitted for simplicity. Furthermore, therespective operations of the cash handling mechanism 10, the operationguidance unit 12 having the pilot lamps 12a, 12b and 12c, and the voicegenerating mechanism will also be omitted for simplicity.

In the following description of the operation of the automatic rentingapparatus, the steps of the operation will each be represented by acombination of a letter "S" and a numeral.

S1: A membership card inserted by a patron in the card inlet 23 is takeninto the automatic renting apparatus.

S2: Upon the detection of the insertion of the membership card by a carddetector, not shown, the main control unit 1 gives a card informationread instruction to the cart R/W unit 15. Then, the card R/W unit 15reads information written in the membership card. The information readby the card R/W unit 15 is transferred through the main control unit 1to the RAM 13 to store the information in the RAM 13. The main controlunit 1 decides, on the basis of the read information, whether or not themembership card is valid. When the membership card is valid, theprocedure goes to step S3. When the membership card is void, themembership card is not accepted and is returned through the card inlet23 to the patron. The main control unit 1 also decides, on the basis ofthe read information, whether or not the validity term of the membershipcard has expired. If the validity term of the membership card hasexpired, the main control unit 1 instructs the validity patron to renewthe term of the membership card by paying a subscriber fee (membershipfee). However, the procedure for the renewal of the validity term of themembership card is not related directly with the present invention, andhence the description thereof will be omitted and the description willbe made on an assumption that all the membership cards are valid.

S3: The main control unit 1 instructs the CRT 14 to display massagesgiving guidance to the patron as to the selection of the content oftransaction. Words "RENTING", "RETURN" and "SUBSCRIPTION" correspondingto the F keys 13a also are displayed on the CRT 14.

S4: The main control unit 1 makes a decision as to whether or not the Fkey 13a corresponding to "RENTING" is pressed. When the decision isaffirmative, the program goes to step S13 and, when negative, theprogram returns to step S1.

S5: The main control unit 1 makes a decision as to whether or not the Fkey 13a corresponding to "RETURN" is pressed. When the decision isnegative, the program goes to step S6 and, when the decision isaffirmative, the article return process is performed. When the patronputs the rental article in the article dispensing and returning opening19 to return the article, the read unit 8a of the article transfermechanism reads the identification code of the rental article. Therenting date information and membership information stored in the rentalinformation storage unit 6a for the article restored to the automaticrenting apparatus are erased and, at the same time, the rental articlenumber and the renting term of the restored article among theinformation concerning the renting and subscription written in themembership card are erased. Then, the membership card is returned to thepatron through the card inlet 23 and a receipt carrying the contents oftransaction printed by the print mechanism 11 is dispensed through thereceipt dispensing opening 26.

S6: The main control unit 1 makes a decision as to whether or not the Fkey 13a corresponding to "SUBSCRIPTION" is pressed. When the same F key13a is pressed, the program goes to step S7 and, when it is not pressed,the program returns to step S4. The loop of steps S4, S5 and S6 isrepeated until the F key 13a is pressed.

S7: The article list including the name and number of the articles instock on the storage shelves 7, and information including the appointeddate of return of rental articles are read from the storage medium ofthe FDD 6 in response to a read instruction provided by the main controlunit 1. The information read from the storage medium of the FDD 6 and amessage prompting the patron to enter the article number of a desiredarticle are displayed on the CRT 14. If the desired article is found inthe article list, the patron is required to enter the article number ofthe desired article by operating the numeric keys 13b within a fixedperiod of time.

S8: The main control unit 1 monitors the entry of the article number andtime. The program goes to step S11 when the article number is enteredwithin the fixed period of time, and the program goes to step S9 when noarticle number is entered within the fixed period of time.

S9: The main control unit provides an instruction to read informationincluding the date of the next supplement of the stock and supplementalarticles to be added to the stock in the next supplement is read fromthe replacement schedule storage unit 6c of the FDD 6. Then, theinformation read from the replacement schedule storage unit 6c and amessage prompting the patron to enter the article number of the desiredarticle are displayed on the CRT 14. The patron requested to enter thearticle number of the desired article by operating the numeric keys 13bwithin a fixed period of time when the desired article is found in theinformation.

S10: The main control unit monitors the entry of the article number andtime. The program goes to step S11 when the article number is enteredwithin the fixed period of time. When no article number is enteredwithin the fixed period of time, the main control unit 1 gives aninstruction to the card R/W unit 15 to return the membership card to thepatron. Then, the membership card is returned through the card inlet 23to the patron, and then the program is ended or the program goes to stepS4. The article number entered in steps S8 or S10 is stored in the RAM 3in combination with the membership information.

S11: The main control unit 1 executes a calculation to determine apossible renting date of the article corresponding to the article numberentered by the patron. The possible renting date, the article name andthe article number are displayed on the CRT 14 to enable the patron toconfirm his order. When the patron approves the possible renting date,the article name and the article number are displayed on the CRT 14, andwhen the patron wishes to subscribe for the article, the patron pressesthe confirmation key 13c.

The calculation of the possible renting date follows the followingprocedure. When the article corresponding to the article number enteredby the patron is in stock on the storage shelves 7, the present date isassigned to the possible renting date. When the article is rented, thescheduled return date of the article is determined from the renting dateinformation stored in the rental information storage unit 6a (FIG. 4) onthe basis of a predetermined number of renting days, and then spare daysfor delayed return of the article is added to the scheduled return dateto decide the possible renting date. When the article is not in stockand is to be added to the stock in the future, a scheduled replacementdate is assigned to the possible renting date. The present date isretrieved from the calendar 4.

S12: The main control unit 1 makes a determined as to whether or not theconfirmation key 13c is pressed, namely, whether or not the patron hasapproved the conditions of the advance subscription. When the patronapproves the conditions of advance subscription, the program goes tostep S13. When the patron does not approve the conditions of advancesubscription, the program returns to step S4 to receive request forrenting another article or returns the membership card to the patron toend the program.

S13: A message is displayed on the CRT 14 to prompt the patron to entera desired renting date by operating the numeric keys 13b when the patrondesires to specify a particular renting date. When the numeric keys 13bare not operated to enter the desired renting date, a message expressingthat the possible renting date is assigned to the desired renting dateis displayed on the CRT 14. When a specific renting date is desired, theoperator enters the specific renting date by operating the numeric keys13b. The desired renting date, as well as the article number for advancesubscription, is stored in the RAM 3.

S14: The main control unit 1 reads information including the articlenumber for which advance subscription has been made, the desired rentingdate and the membership information concerning the patron from the RAM 3and stores the same information in one of the areas of thebattery-backed-up RAM 5 or the subscription information storage unit 6b(FIG. 5) of the FDD 6.

S15: When the F key 13a for "RENTING" is pressed in S4, the main controlunit 1 displays the article names and article numbers of the articles instock on the storage shelves 7 and a message prompting the patron toenter the article number of a desired article on the CRT 14.

S16: The main control unit 1 monitors the entry of the article numberand the passage of a fixed time. When the article number is enteredwithin the fixed period of time the program goes to step S17 and, whenit is not entered within the fixed period, the program returns to stepS4 to receive new advance subscription for another article.

S17: The article number entered by the patron and the correspondingarticle name are displayed on the CRT 14. When the entry is accomplishedcorrectly, a message prompting the patron to press the confirmation key13c to approve the indication on the CRT 14 is displayed on the CRT 14.When the confirmation key 13c is pressed, the main control unit 1determines whether or not the confirmation has been made within thefixed period of time. When the determination is affirmative the programgoes to step S18 and, when negative, the program returns to step S4.

S18: The main control unit 1 gives address information indicating theposition of the desired article on the storage shelves 7 and a deliveryinstruction to the article control unit 9. Then, the article controlunit controls the article transfer mechanism 8 to retrieve the desiredarticle from a storage position corresponding to the address informationon the storage shelves 7 and to deliver the desired article to thearticle dispensing and returning opening 19 to rent the desired articleto the patron. When renting the desired article to the patron, theidentification code of the desired article is read by the read unit 8aand is stored in the RAM 3 by the main control unit 1.

S19: Detecting means, not shown, gives a detection signal indicating thedetection of the extraction of the dispensed article by the patron tothe main control unit 1 to enable the main control unit 1 confirm therenting of the desired article. After the confirmation of the renting ofthe desired article, information including the article number of therented article and the membership information concerning the patron areread from the RAM 3 and are recorded together with renting dateinformation provided by the calendar 4 in one of the storage areas ofthe rental information storage unit 6a.

S20: The main control unit 1 instructs the print mechanism 11 to printthe contents of the transaction for the advance subscription or therenting on a receipt and to dispense the receipt through the receiptdispensing opening 26.

S21: The main control unit 1 instructs the card R/W unit 15 to write theinformation concerning the advance subscription or the renting in therenting/subscription information area and renting history informationarea of the membership card. Then, the membership card is returnedthrough the card inlet 23 to the patron to end the program.

When the article for which the patron made advance subscription isrestored to the storage shelves 7 or the same article is added to thestock, the article is controlled on the basis of the subscriptioninformation so that priority is given to the subscriber for renting thesame article.

Although the invention has been described with reference to a specificembodiment thereof, the present invention is not limited to such anembodiment in practice and many changes and variations are possibletherein.

For example, the renting date information (FIG. 4) stored in the rentalinformation storage unit 6a may be substituted by return dateinformation.

Furthermore, the present invention is applicable to various automaticrenting apparatus respectively for renting various articles, such ascompact disks and records, which can be rented by the patrons, otherthan video tape cassettes.

Still further, it is possible to identify the operator of the automaticrenting apparatus, namely, the discrimination of the operator of theautomatic renting machine as to whether or not the operator is the rightbearer of the membership card, and to obviate troubles when themembership card is lost by writing a secret number assigned to thepatron and requesting the operator to enter the secret number whenoperating the automatic renting apparatus.

Although the invention has been described in its preferred form with acertain degree of particularity, it is to be understood that manyvariations and changes are possible in the invention without departingfrom the scope thereof.

What is claimed is:
 1. An automatic renting apparatus for automaticallyrenting articles and collecting returned articles, said apparatuscomprising;storage shelves for storing articles to be rented; an inputoperation unit having input keys operable by a patron for enteringrental information; an information storage means for storing informationconcerning said articles stored on said storage shelves includingstorage positions of said articles, and for storing informationconcerning said patron; a rental information storage unit for storinginformation concerning rented articles; a replacement scheduleinformation storage unit for storing information concerning new articleswhich are scheduled to replace specified articles stored in said storageshelves including dates in which said new articles are scheduled toreplace said specified articles in said storage shelves; a display unitfor displaying guidance instructions for prompting said patron in theoperation of said input operation unit, and for displaying saidinformation concerning said new articles when an article selected bysaid patron is not located in said storage shelves and is not includesin said information concerning said rented articles; a subscriptioninformation storage unit for storing information concerning articles tobe rented in which advance subscriptions have been made, and for storingrental information concerning an advance subscription which has beeninputted by said patron in said input operation unit.
 2. A method ofsubscription of rented articles in an automatic renting apparatus whichautomatically rents articles and collects returned articles, said methodcomprising the steps of:reading information written in a membershipcard, said membership card being insert into a card dispensing/returningopening of a card read/write unit; judging the validity of themembership card on the basis of said information read from said membersip card; monitoring input information entered into an input operationunit and displaying on a display unit guidance instructions in responseto said input information entered into said input operation unit whensaid membership card is valid; reading rental information concerningrented articles and scheduled dates of return of said rented articlesfrom a rental information storage unit and displaying on said displayunit said rental information when said input information indicates thata selected articles has been rented; and storing in a subscriptioninformation storage unit advance subscription information concerningarticles to be rented and scheduled dates in which said articles are tobe rented when said advance subscription information is entered intosaid input operation unit.
 3. A method of subscription of rentedarticles in an automatic renting apparatus which automatically rentsarticles and collects returned articles, said method comprising thesteps of;reading information written in a membership card, saidmembership card being inserted into a card dispensing/returning openingof a card read/write unit; judging the validity of said membership cardon the basis of said information read from said membership card;monitoring input information entered into an input operation unit anddisplaying on a display unit guidance instructions in response to saidinput information entered into said input operation unit when saidmembership card is valid; reading rental information concerning newarticles which are scheduled to replace specified articles in theapparatus including the scheduled dates in which said new articles areto replace the specified articles in the apparatus from a replacementschedule information storage unit, and displaying on said display unit,said rental information when said input information indicates that aselected article is not in the apparatus and is one of the new articles;and storing in a subscription information storage unit advancesubscription information concerning articles to be rented and schedulesdates in which said articles are to be rented when said advancesubscription information is entered into said input operation unit.